


The Animal Instinct

by Kendrene



Category: The Originals (TV)
Genre: Blow Jobs, F/F, Knotting, Light Bondage, Non-Traditional Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Rutting, g!p Keelin
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-08
Updated: 2019-05-01
Packaged: 2019-11-14 00:20:37
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 16,283
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18041861
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kendrene/pseuds/Kendrene
Summary: When Keelin unexpectedly enters her rut all she wants to do is put some distance between herself her Freya. Her feelings for the witch are complicated - to say the least - and the full moon isn't a good time to acknowledge what her heart wants.But when she's ambushed and nearly killed, it's Freya that rescues her. After that, things take a turn for the interesting.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> A small disclaimer - my extent of knowledge about the show is Youtube compilations and the fan wikia. I've written this story upon request and, while it was definitely fun, I'm also hoping I did the characters justice. 
> 
> As a result, what follows isn't strictly canon.
> 
> The story is complete - I'll be putting up a chapter every Friday.  
> \- Dren

_ "Suddenly something has happened to me _

_ As I was having my cup of tea _

_ Suddenly I was feeling depressed _

_ I was utterly and totally stressed" _

__ The Animal Instinct -  _ _ The Cranberries

 

 

The ring has stopped working.

It is a realization that hits her like a bucket of ice dumped over her head. Keelin sits up straighter, her sweat-plastered shirt resisting the motion before she stands on shaky legs, the armchair she’s been lounging in releasing her with a sucking sound full of reluctance. 

Keelin runs her hands along her forearms, unable to stop a grimace when her palms come away sticky. New Orleans’ late spring nights are always hot, but this one is positively suffocating, the air coming in from the open window redolent with all the things that worms turn to ruin out in the swamps. 

Crickets fill the night with noise whenever there is a pause in the distant sound of traffic that the wind brings in from the highway. They chant their ode to nearing summer, their chorus rising and falling like the revving of an engine. 

The room she and Freya are occupying is shrouded in darkness, the only light coming from a lone streetlamp. Its ruddy orange glow projects a square of light onto the floor, but doesn’t reach further, and Keelin can pick out the contours of the furniture around her only thanks to the keenness of her senses. 

The same hyper-awareness she finds herself cursing with relish in her mind, as it makes her all too sensible to everything she’s come to love about the witch. 

Sure, they’ve not had the smoothest of beginnings, but Keelin feels like that happened a century ago.

There are a million little details she can list with her eyes closed, except that she can never quite push herself to tell Freya about how much faster she make her wolf’s heartbeat. 

Her feet itch with the need to pace out her frustration, but Freya’s gaze is already trained her way, and displaying her nervousness would bring questions Keelin knows she isn’t ready to reply to. 

She forces herself to meet Freya’s inquiring, green look with a leveled stare of her own. 

“I should go.” She says it soft and careful, as is her way with words, and she is proud that her voice holds steady. 

Inside, she’s a completely different story. 

“So soon?” Freya steps into the light and her hair seemingly catch fire. The orange of the streetlamp scatters fiery sparks among the waves of blonde, haloing the witch in a glow that Keelin unironically calls magical. Her eyes turn pensive, looking Keelin over in a careful examination as if trying to find a trace of injury or sickness. Keelin racks her brain for a convincing excuse and comes up empty. 

“My shift starts in a few hours,” she shrugs, hoping it’ll look nonchalant. “I should try to catch at least a little sleep before heading to the hospital.”

“I have a spare room.” Freya offers, almost without pause. “You know the French Quarter is unsafe at night.”

“And you know I can defend myself if there is need to.” Keelin keeps her voice lowered to a gentle purr, not wanting Freya to think she’s shrugging off her kindness. Each and every one of her bones ache to bridge the gap between them, to lay a hand on Freya’s arm and let her know that her gesture is well received. Instead, her hands ball into fists at her sides, fingers clenched so hard that her knuckles hurt. 

She is afraid that if she gave in to her desires she wouldn’t let the witch go and, while she’s spent many nights imagining how it would feel to make love to Freya, she wouldn’t want it to happen like this. 

Not when she feels her other nature violently pushing to come to the fore.

When it will happen between them - if it will happen (God and isn’t she presumptuous in thinking that it will at all!) Keelin wants to be entirely in control.

“Besides I don’t want to impose.” 

She mutters the words so fast they almost fall over each other, cheeks heated by a scorching blush, and she is grateful for the murkiness that shrouds her features in long shadows. 

“I’ll…I’ll see you soon.” She grabs her jacket and walks briskly to the door, knowing that if Freya tries to stop her she may very well agree to stay. Her will is fraying along the edges, weakened by the call of the rising full moon, which feels like a weight pulling at her neck.

Tugging her ever downwards, toward the wolf she is inexorably bound to. 

Already Keelin feels the change come over her. When she carefully tongues her incisors they feel longer, sharper and more akin to fangs than human teeth. And pressure is building down between her legs, one that causes her to keep her back to Freya. Cold sweat runs in rivers down her back and terror rims her lungs with frost at the thought that the witch could chance to see her cock pushing at the front of her pants as it grows. 

In her rush to leave, she stumbles out the door and down the creaking stairs, shoulder smacking into the wall when she leaps down the steps far too fast. She can feel the witch’s footsteps following, but thankfully Freya doesn’t raise her voice to call her back. 

Still, Keelin can feel the blonde’s hurt gaze boring into her back long after she’s reached street level, and is sure that - were she to glance up - she’d find Freya staring at her through her living room window.

She allows herself a moment of respite, leaning her shoulder against the brick wall of a café that is shuttered for the night. Glancing into its darkened windows, she manages a glimpse at her reflection – hazy and somewhat warped as she sometimes imagines her second nature to be, the only detail standing out eyes of yellow-gold that stare back and seem to mock her.

Keelin tears her gaze away and shakes her head, blaming the fever she feels burning just below her skin for making her see things that aren’t there. One thing is certain, however, she shouldn’t linger out more than necessary.

Already her will is fraying, the wolf locked within its cage of human flesh and bone pushing to come out. And Freya wasn’t wrong when she’d said that the French Quarter isn’t safe – Keelin has had targets painted on her back before, and she’d rather it didn’t happen again.

She quickens her step, going as fast as her legs will carry her without actually breaking into a run. But she can’t outpace what’s already within, and her inner wolf smells her fear.

The ring, Keelin fears, has made her complacent. She’s grown accustomed to being the one in control, having her wolf at beck and call, should she need it to fight. And even when it sits quietly at her feet, she is still stronger and faster than a normal human being has any right to be.

Tonight her powers have deserted her, or rather they whip hurricanes around her bones, refusing to be brought under control. One moment Keelin feels so cold her teeth chatter, hard enough to make the enamel crack, the next she’s burning hot as if she weren’t in New Orleans any longer, but withering under Nevada’s unflinching sun.

She comes to a stop, head lowered, breath leaving her in short, labored bursts, and when she blindly reaches out to find something to hold on to, nails that have grown into claws screech along concrete.

Dread settles heavy on her shoulders – she needs to make it back to her apartment. Fast.

Looking around to find her bearings, Keelin realizes she’s closer to her apartment than she thought. The fever must be playing havoc with her perception of time, and it doesn’t help that her body aches all over, far more than the exertion she just put herself through would justify.

Spasms race up her spine, and Keelin has to bite the inside of her cheek bloody to keep herself from crying out. When her eyes stop watering, the pain receding to a ball of heat at the nape of her neck, she darts across the road, and into the public park beyond. 

Cutting through the shadowed paths that snake among copses of oak so old that it’d take five people to hug one of the massive trunks, may not be the safest of ideas, but Keelin - who jogs around the area as part of the workout routine - knows she’ll shave off precious minutes in reaching her place by doing so. 

She follows one of the twisting gravel footpaths for a while, and she’s running now, feeling more like deer than the wolf she really is. Her shoes crunch across the pebbles, grit spraying onto the grass when she takes a bend in the path at full speed. She’s causing enough noise to wake the dead, and yet sound doesn’t travel far, the canopy of trees around her absorbing most of it. Nocturnal animals scamper off into the bushes when she races by, the chorus of crickets faltering before a lone one resumes its chant once it’s sure she’s past its hiding spot.

In the gaps left by vegetation, Keelin can spot the houses on the park’s other side. These are old buildings, remnants of a time that, while past, has left visible scars all across the country. The city mansions of the wealthy look at their most severe this time of night, the pallid facades corpse-white, windows like gaping, toothless mouths. 

Keelin wonders how many souls those walls devoured.

The heady fragrance of flowers in bloom fills her nose, adding to the illusion that the city closing in around the park is just an afterthought. At this time of night, Keelin can almost believe that the man-made buildings lay completely empty, ready to be reclaimed by the ever growing greenery surrounding her. And as for her, she feels like a trespasser who has no right to tread among the trees.

Perhaps because she already is unbalanced, the thought resonates oddly inside her skull. The trees acquire an air of menace, their lowest branches transforming into skeletal hands ready to drag her off the path, to a verdant tomb where nobody will ever find her.

Her feet skid to a halt, the fever-induced hallucination gaining firm root inside her mind, and Keelin drops to a crouch with her weight balanced on the balls of her feet, ready to spring at whatever enemy her mind will conjure next.

The logical part of her – which is rapidly shrinking in size – screams loud warnings in her ears;  _ this is all a dream,  _ it says,  _ wake up! Run home! _

But she is glued to the spot, incapable of moving.

The trees shift in front of her eyes and bar her way, trunks phasing in and out of existence as her vision blurs. Keelin snarls, a ripping sound that tears the night apart around her, and challenges the oaks, willing them to let her through.

She’s so caught up in the nightmare evoked by her brain, that she smells the humans only when they are almost on top of her.

There’s three, their scents spiked with the artificially-induced adrenaline of drugs, but they don’t shy away at her sight. The realization somewhat grounds her into reality; she blinks and the trees go back to being trees.

The men, however, do not vanish.

As they close in, the reek wafting from their unwashed bodies makes her gag. It’s not just that; whatever they took left a chemical imprint in their scent, one that reminds her of a werewolf gone rabid.

The red fog clouding her thoughts momentarily lifts, and Keelin inwardly reels. She’s heard of a new drug – a scientific journal or two even ran articles on it – that is commonly known among dealers as “Fang”. Plus, the case of a man who’d tried to tear a paramedic’s throat open with his teeth while under its influence, made national news a couple of weeks ago.

Keelin and her colleagues had agreed the name was stupid, and the way the newscasters had described it as the “werewolf drug” just another case of fear mongering.

Now, with her nose stuffed full of their stench, she’s starting to think a kernel of truth hides behind the journalistic love for hyperbole.

“Your wallet.” One of them steps forward, flanked by the other two. His eyes gleam murderous in the lone light of one of the park’s lamps, a hint of crimson dancing deep inside his irises. “Hand it over.”

“I don’t have it.”

It’s true; she didn’t think of grabbing it when Freya called her, only shoving her apartment’s keys and her I.D. into a pocket before leaving the house.

The thug sneers, clearly not believing her.

“We’ll take it from you then.”

They waste no time following through with the threat, spreading out around her to circle her like vultures. One of them lounges in, fingers scraping at the back of her shoulders, but, with a swift blow of her elbow, Keelin makes him stagger back to nurse a broken nose.

“Bitch!”

He grunts in pain, his voice somewhat garbled by the hand he’s pressing on his face to stem the blood flow. Its copper smell fills the air around them, exciting Keelin’s wolf and the beast within her drags her forward in a frenzied attack, seeking to spill more.

The second man has barely enough time to throw an arm up to protect his face before she lashes out, claws biting bloody gauges into his forearm.  He falls, with Keelin leaping on top of his writhing form, but manages to throw her off with a desperate jerk of his hips.

Gravel scratches the palms of her hands when she throws her arms out to cushion the fall, her legs instinctually gathered underneath her to propel her back into the fray.

There is no reining her wolf in now; it howls inside her, making her bones ache, and Keelin thinks it is a wonder she hasn’t already shifted. Maybe the ring still has an effect on her, if lessened, or her force of will is stronger than she gives herself credit for.

The two men she managed to hit have climbed back to their feet, wary but undeterred, and, clutched in the fist of the third one she spots the sharp glint of a serrated blade.

Her claws, she knows, can cut as well as any knife, but it’s only a matter of time before one of the men’s blows strikes true. Her movements, which would normally be fast enough to allow her to dodge easily are slowed, and the battle raging inside her debilitating.

When the thug’s blade wounds her, she can do nothing to prevent it from happening. Her attacker comes in low, knife aimed at her belly, while one of his accomplices grabs Keelin by her forearm. 

Somehow, Keelin manages to twist away at the last minute, but the blade still cuts into her side, deep enough that she’ll need stitches. It’s not the first knife wound she receives and she knows what to expect; numbness in the beginning, even as warm blood trickles from the cut, then an itchy feeling, like pins and needles scratching at flesh before pulsing pain starts in earnest. 

What happens instead, has her crumbling to her knees and she screams, her whole body convulsing as it seemingly catches fire.

_ Silver. _

The blade is coated in silver.

Shadows blot out the night as the thugs close around her in a tight circle, and Keelin tilts her head up, watching them through a haze of tears. Inside of her, the wolf has ceased its howling, coerced into a shocked silence by the poison seeping into her bloodstream from the wound. 

Freya was right; she should have accepted her offer and stayed the night. 

The knife wielder raises the blade two-handed, intent on ending the fight, but before he can bring it down one final time the air turns frosty. Winters are never cold in New Orleans, not this  _ cold _ at least. Not cold enough to make breath mist in little, white clouds in front of Keelin’s face. Not cold enough to cover the naked metal of the blade with ice. 

The stench of burning ozone makes it almost impossible to breathe; frigid air spirals down Keelin’s lungs, lining them with frost. She coughs, but before she can figure out what’s happening the night turns twice as hot as it was before. 

The sweat which froze on her body evaporates. 

The blade burns cherry-red and the thug drops it with a scream, his hand badly singed.

“Leave.” Freya’s voice echoes among the trees, coming from everywhere and nowhere all at once. “Or die.” 

Forces waning rapidly, Keelin falls face-first on the ground, too sickened by the silver to feel anything but searing pain. 

Her mind goes blank, agony descending on her bones like a snow whiteout, and the last thing she hears is Freya. 

The witch is calling her name.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Freya rescues Keelin and a new threat is uncovered.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here's chapter 2 as promised! I'll see you in a week with chapter 3!

Keelin comes to, feeling like there’s an entire desert inside her lungs. Her throat is scratched raw and, when her lips part, she spits out a mouthful of gravel and dirt. With a flash of clarity she realizes that she’s still face down, but even if she was lying on her back it would not make much of a difference. 

The little of the night she can see through the haze of tears shimmering across her vision is a kaleidoscope of oranges and dancing shadows. It doesn’t help that she can keep only one eye open, the other hurting too much when she tries to raise her eyelid. Sounds pour slowly inside her ears, oddly amplified, and there’s an odd keening in the breeze.

Reedy,  _ helpless  _ screams. 

Bringing her hands under her body to try and roll herself over takes forever, and Keelin desists as soon as she starts trying, nausea and pain too overwhelming.

The entirety of her body is cold, frozen, from extremities that she can barely feel, to her very insides. The only source of heat is the wound opened by the silver blade; it burns and throbs, fiery and all-consuming, the skin immediately around it itching so badly that Keelin would scratch it off if she just could. 

“Easy.” 

There is a crunch of gravel next to her and the next moment hands light upon her shoulders, firm but gentle.

“It’s Freya.” The cold, terrible rage has left the witch’s voice, replaced by barely masked concern. “I’m going to turn you over, okay?” 

Keelin can’t articulate anything more than a small noise, but it must be sufficient, because Freya moves her, easing her first on her side, and then onto her back. The world moves alongside her; it tilts and bucks as if she was standing on a raft tossed around by waves. 

Words redolent with power fill the night, their magic soothing now - a balm rather than a weapon. The cold recedes and finally, she can open both of her eyes. Freya’s face hovers inches above hers, her expression the closest to fear that Keelin has ever seen. She knows from experience that it takes a lot to upset the witch, and the near panic she sees dancing inside the verdant depths of her eyes has her wondering about her wound. 

The silver poisoning is like burning gasoline being spilled down her throat, but the blade was only coated in it, not made entirely of the metal or cursed to be particularly effective against her kind. One would go through that kind of hassle only if hunting for werewolves, for the blessing of such a blade is neither cheap nor simple. No - the thug’s knife had been wrought to harm the supernatural, but not a distinct kind of it. 

Keelin is almost sure of it; her fight had been happenstance and bad luck. They tried to rob her, but they may as well have crossed paths with a mere mortal. The men had been rabid dogs that didn’t care for anything other than easy made money to get themselves another dose of drugs.

The men.

Heart hammering inside her chest, Keelin tries to sit up, the wolf whimpering when muscles weakened by the bane of silver cramp in protest. She can almost see her inner beast, curled up in a tight ball, head tucked under its tail, as it shakes and snarls at what is eating away at it. The wolf snarls, showing its fangs in warning, but this kind of threat it cannot stop with tooth and claw alone. 

Keelin manages a cursory look at the clearing, noting blackened spots on the ground where the gravel seems to have melted together, before she falls back down with a groan. 

“They are gone,” Freya says, and it’s obvious that she had a part in that. Keelin doesn’t ask any more details; she’s seen the witch’s magic at work before and its results. 

Normally she’d have preferred a less final outcome, but between the sickness wracking her and the onset of her rut still gnawing at her bones, she can’t find a shred of pity, no matter how deep within herself she scrapes. 

Besides, had she not been wounded, Keelin doubted she’d have managed to keep the wolf from taking over. The end result would have been the same if messier by far.

“I need to get you out of here.” Freya cups her cheeks and she gasps, arching into the touch. Energy flows from the witch’s fingertips and into her, the pain pushed into a corner, confined behind a wall of shimmering magic. Freya’s will takes form, the energy she channels becoming a shield that protects Keelin from the worst of the pain. The silver poisoning isn’t gone of course, but Freya’s actions buy them time to deal with it.

The relief is only temporary, but Keelin welcomes it, and, with Freya’s help, she manages to sit up and eventually gather enough strength to stand. 

“Your place is closer, and I brought things that I may need to help.” Freya wraps an arm around her and pulls her close, shouldering some of her weight. Keelin leans against her with no little hesitation; she’s used to be the one that leads others through a crisis, the one who heals other people’s hurts, and the situation is new to her. 

And, being so close to Freya again, with the other woman’s curves pressed into her side, brings her first predicament back to the forefront of her mind.

Keelin grits her teeth, thanking all the Gods she can recall the names of that the witch is too concerned with her wound to notice other things. It’s stupid, she knows, especially because silver poisoning can have deadly consequences, while her accidental boner is nothing more than a source of embarrassment, but she cannot help the way her brain works.

The wolf within her is calmer now, soothed by Freya’s closeness, and, when they start walking toward her apartment, it doesn’t whine, or resist despite the fact that moving is still painful.

True, the searing agony is dulled by magic for the time being, but every step is an exercise in willpower, and Keelin feels like she’s sweating rivers before they have made it out of the park. 

Focusing on placing a foot in front of the other helps only so much, and soon enough her mind wanders back to the attackers and the weapon that they carried.

“The city’s underbelly has always been aware of its… unique... denizens.” Freya murmurs next to her, making her realize she’s been muttering aloud. 

“The most unscrupulous of individuals will often see opportunities in the supernatural.” The witch continues when Keelin throws her a questioning look. “Some forget  _ who  _ it is exactly that they are dealing with, though.”

“I see.” She doesn’t, not really, but there will be time to ask more questions when she isn’t bleeding and ill. Keelin is too new to New Orleans to have learned all there is to know about the city. Places like this, places where lines of power that predate any human settlement reach as deep as ancient roots into the soil often take years to be understood. And, despite her very nature, she’s always shied away from things too…  _ magical _ . Like any other werewolf, Keelin is inherently distrustful toward those that practice magic, centuries of bloodshed practically imprinted into her DNA. Their blood, their pelt, their fangs ripped out under a full moon; since time immemorial her kind has been the subject of obscure and often violent rituals.

Thus, Keelin had avoided witches and warlocks like the plague, at least until life and fate had determined she and Freya should cross paths. It’s lucky that they have, and Keelin does not regret the unexpected turn her life has taken since their first encounter.

Normally, going from the park to her apartment takes no more than five minutes at a brisk pace, but they are crawling along the sidewalk instead of walking. Freya supports her as best she can, but the burst of energy the witch infused into her body is waning rapidly, trickling from her with each step, and she sways, dangerously close to  falling . 

“Almost there.” Freya’s tone is strained, the effort of holding her up evident both in her voice and her expression. The chill brought forth by her magic has left completely, and the night around them feels now doubly suffocating. The hour is late enough that they do not meet other people, the stores and restaurants they pass all shuttered for the night. It’s all good really; the last thing they need is someone calling the police, thinking they’re doing them a favor. 

At the end of the road, the yellow and red sign of the Chinese restaurant Keelin sometimes orders from shines gold, a beacon of hope in the darkness of the night. 

She’s home. Almost.

It’s a good thing that the building where she rents has an elevator - an old cage that moans and rattles whenever it’s put to use, but still better than nothing - because Keelin doubts she could climb the stairs. 

The cut is bleeding less than she originally thought it would, even taking the walk into account, but the poisoning has spread; she can feel the heat radiate from the wound and knows that, if she looked, her skin would appear reddened. She had treated a young werewolf who had been poisoned with silver once, none of the human doctors understanding why gangrene had spread so fast and is aware of what could happen if Freya wasn’t with her. 

A slow and painful death, the body rotting away as the poison takes hold, burning with fever while organs shut down and collapse one after the other. 

After all, Keelin had seen it first hand with her patient, who, in fear of being outed for what he was, had come to seek help too late to do him any good. 

Entering her apartment is a relief for a number of reasons. First, the quiet click of her air conditioning unit keeps the suffocating heat confined outside, and second, it’s akin to stepping into her wolf’s den. Her beast is in too much pain to cause her any trouble, but the agony eating away at it leaves Keelin vulnerable. Familiar things and well-known scents ease its suffering, and, when Freya helps her to stretch out on the couch, it whimpers its relief through her own lips. 

The witch works quickly, the apprehension she is feeling well masked as she strips Keelin of her blood-streaked shirt. 

The cool air of the room skirts across her sweat-sheened belly and Keelin shivers, yet the absence of friction against the wound is a definite improvement. 

Through eyes slitted by pain, she watches Freya empty a satchel onto the floor, wondering how the witch had known to come to her rescue, but not surprised. It’s not the first time that the woman turns up without prompting when she’s in trouble, and Keelin suspects it may have something to do with the Sight. Usually, Freya answers her questions about magic with openness, but on this matter, she has been tight-lipped, and Keeling hasn’t pushed. She knows full well that some gifts can be extremely hard to bear. 

Untethered by fever, her mind drifts, and she finds herself wondering how knowledge of what is to pass manifests in the young witch. Had Freya seen her being attacked, or had the Sight alerted her through a sense of dread that she could not explain nor shake off? 

Something cold touches her belly and she jumps, a soft gasp leaving her lips. 

“Sorry.” 

Keelin looks down to find Freya holding a slim blade. It doesn’t look like a regular knife; the blade is slender, delicate and slightly curved, and angular letters march up its entire length. A ceremonial blade then - athame - Keelin is almost sure that’s the right word for it. 

“Do it.” Freya nods, the blade’s sharp edge whispering along the wound and cutting deep as she wields it with expert, unwavering hand.

Keelin has read every book and dissertation on lycanthropy she could get her hands on during her residency, and what Freya is doing is textbook procedure. Even though most of the medical world treats her kin as ailed by an illness with no cure - akin to Ebola or Lupus -  the consensus in case of silver poisoning is unanimous. Bloodletting, followed by transfusions, which as it turns out can be as deadly as the poison. 

Werewolf physiology is different enough from a human’s that often times the body will reject the blood, and cause the patient’s death. 

A transfusion is out of the question anyhow; it would imply going to the hospital, where there’d be no way for her to hide what she is. For Keelin that would mean losing her job and, should she survive treatment, ending up locked away inside a CDC facility to be experimented on.

The athame digs a line into her flesh, and the wound thus enlarged resumes bleeding. Keelin can’t tear her gaze away, staring mesmerized as blood wells inside the cut to spill onto her belly and then the couch.

It’s the wrong color - even if she were not a doctor she’d notice that - so dark it veers to black. Part of the reason why silver is so dangerous to werewolves is that it bonds with their blood’s red cells and oxidizes them, the most visible reaction being the victim’s blood turning black where the substance’s concentration is highest. In Keelin’s case, that means the knife wound.

Freya angles the blade, keeping the wound wide open, and Keelin finds time to mourn the loss of her couch - not even magic will be enough to get rid of the bloodstain seeping into its fabric - before she starts to feel too dizzy to think.

“That should do it.” The witch announces, just as she lets her head fall back onto the couch, the muscles of her neck turned to jelly. Eyes closed, nausea making the room sway around her, Keelin manages a tiny nod. She has no idea what Freya will do next, but is sure that the magical equivalent of a transfusion won’t be pleasant.

Confirming her fears, the witch covers Keelin’s hand with hers, squeezing tightly.

“I trust you.” Keelin forces the words through gritted teeth, opening her eyes to meet Freya’s surprised gaze. “I knew you were going to say it’s gonna hurt.” Her smile feels more like a grimace, but Freya smiles back, gently pushing locks of sweat-soaked hair away from her face.

“It will,” Freya’s fingers move, her hand sculpting around Keelin’s jaw. Her touch is tender, careful and it takes all of Keelin’s willpower not to nuzzle into it. “I can burn the rest of the silver from your body, but…”

“I understand.”

“I don’t think you really do.”

Keelin has time to open her mouth to ask what Freya means before a wave of energy hits her, searing pain traversing her chest. She gasps, her mouth working noiselessly as if she were drowning, except that her lungs are filled with fire instead of water. Uncontrollable spasm wreck her frame, and it takes Freya’s weight pinning her down to keep her from flying off the couch.

Her back arches hard enough that Keelin’s spine groans and cracks in protest as her bones –squeezed by clenching muscles - grind painfully together.

Somehow  - miraculously – she doesn’t black out, but it makes the whole experience worse. Her blood seems to reach boiling point, only to turn to ice in her veins with her next heartbeat.

Time stretches around them, Freya surrounded by a visible aura of crackling power. Keelin can see it, despite the veil of tears that plunges the room around her into a confused haze. 

The nimbus is silver-grey in color, brighter flashes blazing through it. It almost seems like the witch has managed to trap a thunderstorm and give it form, pulling it around her shoulders like a cloak. 

The pain grows, unmeasurable, untenable, driving Keelin to the edge of madness. Then, just as suddenly as it settled over her bones, it’s gone, and she can draw the first, shaky breath in what feels like a century. 

It’s ironic really, that the emptiness that comes after the pain has left, is what makes her pass out in the end. 

*******************

Nose to the wind, Keelin stalks from shadow to shadow, paws padding silently on grass and gravel alike. 

She’s back in the park, New Orleans’ suffocating heat wrapped like a wet blanket around her. It dampens her fur and, in the orange glow of a lone streetlamp, the dark brown of her pelt glistens and shines, making her look honey-colored.

_ Back in the park?  _ She halts, one paw half raised mid-step, tail twitching as confusion fills her mind. It lasts only a moment before Keelin shakes herself off, huffing and yapping softly in the wolf’s equivalent of a snort. 

Of course, she’s in the park. She’s here to hunt. 

At that thought, her stomach aches and rumbles, her maw filling with drool. She lets her jaw hang open, tongue lolling out and air licking at her fangs as her lips pull back into a hunger-filled snarl.

A flash of movement catches her attention, and she leans forward; her ears pull back until they’re laying flat against her skull, and she drops behind the cover of some well-trimmed bushes, belly scraping the ground as she observes her prey. 

In wolf form - not the two-legged half-breed caught between animal and human - but  _ actual _ wolf, Keelin is rangy and angular, a little smaller than the members of the New Orleans pack she’s crossed paths with. In some ways it’s an advantage; she’s fast and agile, and the werewolves who’d decided to test her mettle, have found out very quickly that her size doesn’t make her automatically weak. Her jaws are strong enough she can easily crunch through bone, her claws are sharp, and Keelin knows how to use both very well. 

She can smell her now - the woman she’s been hunting; her scent tastes cold on Keelin’s tongue, like freshly fallen snow, yet she feels old enough to make her want to tuck her tail between her legs and piss herself. Infuriated, Keelin paws at the ground, kicking up a storm of dirt with her hind legs, before she sprints from the bushes, propelling herself forward in an explosion of movement. 

She rampages without care through the undergrowth, branches snapping loudly in her wake. Her prey will hear her come, but she is done with being subtle.

Eyes piercing the shadows that reign underneath the trees, Keelin manages to glimpse blonde hair, the outline of a face as the woman throws a look over her shoulder. 

They are both running now, but where she expected her target to flee in panic, she finds herself lead along in clever chase. The path the woman has chosen takes them to the heart of the park where trees grow thickest and no artificial light can reach. There, in the middle of a clearing bathed in moonlight, her prey stops, whirling around to face her. 

A light brighter than a thousand suns shoots from her outstretched hands and a burning smell like that of a lighting bolt striking wood pricks Keelin’s nose. She manages to leap away - barely - rolling head over paws and hitting the ground hard. As she rights herself, tail held upright in a stiff arc and muzzle lowered as she readies herself to spring at the woman’s throat, her eyes find the patch of grass where she has been standing moments before. 

Vegetation is gone, a shallow crater with edges as smooth as glass in its place. A shiver runs through Keelin’s form, and she howls to try and chase away the fear that twists her gut into knots. Mucus flies from her gaping maw, and she clicks her jaws shut threateningly, claws raking the ground at her feet. 

Her target stares at her with eyes harder than stone, her face betraying nothing as she raises both hands again, readying herself for another strike. The air between them shimmers, energy gathering at the woman’s fingertips. Keelin moves, rushing forward with one ground-eating leap; she cannot miss, knowing that if she does the blast will hit her squarely. There’s no doubt in her mind that she will fare as badly as the grass. 

She’s halfway through the leap, her jaws open as wide as they will go when - thanks to a ray of moonlight piercing through the trees  _ just right _ \- she gets her first real good look at her prey’s face.

_ Freya? _

_ Oh Gods, no.  _

Horrified, Keelin tries to twist away but it’s too late, and her jaws snap shut around the witch’s pretty face.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> While Keelin falls prey to her own nightmares, Freya investigates the nature of the knife that wounded the werewolf.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry! I'm a day late I know, but I crashed from tiredness yesterday evening and totally forgot to update...
> 
> \- Dren

Keelin almost chokes on her own scream.

“ _Freya!_ ”

She clutches at her throat and bolts upright, heart hammering away at her ribs as if it were trying to break free.

For one long, terror-filled moment, dream and real world mesh and her brain is unable to separate one from the other. The metallic taste of blood coats her tongue too thickly. It feels too real. Keelin tries and fails to work some moisture back into her mouth. Even if she could, she isn’t sure it’d help the taste. Scrubbing her teeth a thousand times wouldn’t either.

She screws her eyes shut, willing the image of Freya’s blood-streaked face to recede, praying it isn’t real. When she opens them again, darkness surrounds her.

Ever so slowly, her heart quietens and the roar of blood inside her ears dies down so that Keelin can pick up what sounds are laying underneath.

Blankets rustle when she moves - as she kicks her legs experimentally relief floods in with the realization that she’s still in human form - and the low murmur of an air conditioner has her tilt her head to track the noise. She feels it too on her heated skin: a whisper of cool air that freezes the sweat running down her face.

Keelin cannot see a thing, yet the room feels familiar. It smells of her, although most of it is pain and sickness, but the images flashing through her mind help her know that she’s right.

They’re fleeting, rushing past her faster than a train, and in the end, all she ends up seeing are colors that bloom across her vision as if she had been staring directly into the sun. There are a few, however, that she catches sight of long enough to make sense of them.

One, in particular, makes her blood run cold.

The sharp blade of a knife, glittering orange in the weak glow of a lone streetlamp.

Along with it comes a pain so sudden that Keelin doubles over, both hands pressed into her side. Her fingertips graze linen bandages and she pokes at the wound they hide, hissing when the pain expands into a steady beat.

The image finally fades, but the chills linger and Keelin shudders, lying back down and pulling the blankets up to her chin. She is cold - colder than she’s ever felt since moving South - but underneath the shivers rushing down her spine she detects the heat of fever. The sudden chills, the rivulets of sweat burning her eyes, the bone-deep fatigue that makes the blanket she is huddling under feel like it was made of lead - it all makes sense.

It’s because of the wound - she can smell that too - the hurt radiating from it in waves of almost visible red, but also something else.

She twists around, trying to find a more comfortable position and, when she presses her thighs together, she understands the rest.

Her rut, leaving Freya’s apartment in a hurry, everything comes back to Keelin. Overwhelmed, she buries her face into the pillow, her hands clutching the rumpled sheets under her body.

She is crying, her tears leaving a tongue-curdling aftertaste in her mouth, and she doesn’t know why.

It takes some time to calm down, but gradually her shoulders still and the fever ravaging her body dries her tears. Her head is stuffed with wood, and Keelin tries to shake apathy off, knowing that if she lets the warmth of the bed seep in too deeply she will fall asleep.

Resolute, she kicks the blankets halfway to the floor, meaning to get up and figure out if she really _is_ back at her place. Teeth gritted against the mounting pain, she pushes until she’s sitting up, her back resting against the bed’s cast iron headboard.

The cold and the somewhat uncomfortable position help lift the drowsiness a little, and Keelin starts to think that she will make it to her feet. She does not, however, get that far. When she tries, her legs can’t hold her weight and she collapses, biting a scream into the nearest pillow when – while falling - she bumps her injured side.

Her newfound energy leaves her, as quickly as it had come, and all Keelin can do is remember to breathe.

Eventually, despite her putting up a fight, fatigue has the best of her and Keelin sinks into a restless sleep. Dreams come and go – in some she is human, in others she finds russet fur where skin should be. Haunting each and every one of them is Freya.

*********

Under the burnished yellow light of a filament lamp, the knife is a misshapen lump of metal. Freya’s magic melted the blade and charred the grip, and if she wants to try and trace it to its source she ought to do something about that. Her attention, however, keeps wandering elsewhere.

She’s never been inside Keelin’s apartment before, and her curiosity is piqued. Freya doesn’t really know what she expected, but the place looks barely lived in. Everything is brand new; from the kitchen appliances shining weakly in the low light that streams in from the street, to the couch, which looks so pristine she wonders if anyone ever sat on it at all.

In a way she supposes it makes sense. Keelin’s job at the hospital must keep her so busy that she barely uses her home except to sleep. Still, considering the doctor’s recent move to New Orleans, Freya had anticipated at least a little clutter. The one thing that’s out of place is the lamp she switched on to examine what is left of the knife.

An ornate, heavy thing of brass and wood, the lamp almost diminishes the desk it’s sitting on. If she’d found it in an antique shop, or some old and dusty library, Freya wouldn’t have spared it a second glance. Here – inside an apartment so new it still smells faintly of paint and turpentine – the object looks extraordinary.

She lets her fingers follow the chiseled lines of wood: the lamp is almost impossibly smooth to the touch, as if someone had sung it out of the initial block of material instead of carving it. And it _is_ old - old enough that, unless it carried some sentimental meaning, Keelin would have swapped it long ago for a lighter and more practical one.

_Maybe I should ask her about it, when she’s better._

Freya presses her lips together, eyes going back to the ruined knife. She and Keelin are like it in a way. Superficially, they know each other - she would say they’re friends - but neither of them has any idea of what lies between the surface. Werewolf and witch are words that define what they are, but say nothing about the who.

“Time to find out.”

Her tone is firm and clipped, her voice low so as not to disturb Keelin’s rest. The sole indication of her worry is the wrinkle Freya feels forming on her brow. What she intends is in theory very simple, but all spells are until one tries to put them into practice. Only because she is alone, Freya acknowledges her nerves, clenching her hands into tight fists to stop the tremors running down her arms.

Once she has brought herself back under control, she extends both hands - palms down - and lowers them to the table, stopping when her fingers are an inch away from touching the knife.

Freya closes her eyes, slowing her breath and compartmentalizing the way she has been taught. Letting go of her thoughts requires effort and sweat dampens her face, but eventually her mind is a sea becalmed. Pushing her worry for Keelin to the side, is the hardest thing of all.

Finally ready, she fills herself with the memory of how the knife was the first time she saw it - the wide, serrated blade sharp and the handle matted for a better grip. Words pour out of her, and along with the spell comes anger. She barks the latin out, snarls each line of the spell through clenching teeth. Temperature drops, the sweat crystallizes on her forehead, but below her hands the metal is liquefied again.

Freya doesn’t need to look at it to know: a spellcaster’s success mostly depends on an unshakable faith in their intent. To look at the knife and see her spell in action, would be to doubt.

The fact that everything, no matter how broken or twisted out of shape, retains a basic template of its original intent helps. The metal _remembers_ its function as a knife and, when Freya feeds it the necessary energy, it reforges itself into one eagerly enough.

To someone observing her, the process would be too fast to follow. But Freya is aware of every little molecule clicking back in place and, when her words dry up, she has to grasp the desk to avoid falling on her face.

Blood is dripping from her nose, she can taste the droplets running down her lips and chin, but she doesn’t care.

The spell worked and the knife glints up from the table, as dangerous as it ever was. She recognizes it for a hunting knife, elegant in its simplicity, yet deadlier by far than anything she could buy online. The blade is steel, the broader part treated with a titanium bath for durability. The serrated edge is what sets it apart, the silver shining pale like moonlight under the lamp.

Freya picks it up and turns it slowly, looking for any clue that could tell her where it was forged. She finds the mark she is looking for at the joint of blade and hilt.

The Greek letter Theta, etched into the flat of the blade, the lines so fine it’s visible only when Freya holds the knife a certain way.

“A symbol of death for an instrument of death. How appropriate.”   

Her simmering anger becomes an ire so all consuming Freya would not be surprised to go up in flames.

Without the brand, it would be nigh impossible to trace the knife back to the maker. But the kind of blacksmiths that craft weapons such as this are a hubris-driven bunch; they have been since the first time Hephaestus used a hammer to strike metal.     

_I’ll find the bastard and make him eat his own damn knife._

A howl derails her train of thought, the pain contained inside it so intense Freya grits her teeth in sympathy.

There will be time come morning to examine why she craves revenge so badly.

Keelin needs her now.

*********

Freya’s steps are hesitant as she enters Keelin’s bedroom, dreading what she’ll find.

Her senses aren’t as keen as a werewolf’s of course, but Keelin’s distress is like a physical barrier Freya has to wade through. Pain, anger, an almost paralyzing fear, each emotion sends sparks racing along her nerves.

Freya has seen Keelin in her wolf form other times: she is smaller than others of her kind, her fur a deep russet in color, thick and unbelievably soft to the touch. When Keelin turns, her eyes go from dark brown to a pale amber specked with orange, and shine like golden coins as they gather the light. Freya has met her wolfish stare but a handful of times, yet she can recall each of them with clarity.

She enters Keelin’s room as quietly as she can, but the woman raises her head anyway, her pupils dilating with the sudden change in lighting. To Freya’s relief, her gaze is still a human one.

As far as she understands, the change is a very private thing similar to a witch’s coming of age. Where she and her kin experience the disorientation at the onset of their powers once in life however, werewolves deal with that trauma on the regular. The breaking and remaking of a body is like rebirth, with all the pain and complications that entails.

Freya had expected to be greeted by the liquid snap of bone and sinew, the flensing of muscle and the heavy drip of blood. Instead, she finds Keelin curled up on the bed, eyes rolling and wild as the werewolf stares back.

Danger coats her tongue thicker than honey, but Freya wills herself on, her movements steady. Wounded and scared as she is, Keelin is – like any other beast – at her most threatening. Freya doesn’t like to think of her in those terms, but disregarding that part of Keelin’s nature could prove deadly.

“I’m here.” She soothes when Keelin whimpers again, back arching as a set of spasm shakes her bones. “May I come closer?”   

For a time, rasping, labored breathing is her only answer then, just as she is about to ask again, Keelin finally speaks. Her eyes have adjusted to the sliver of light filtering inside the bedroom, and overall she looks more focused.

“You s-shouldn’t be h-here.” Keelin’s teeth are chattering so hard, it’s a wonder they aren’t breaking.

“What I should do and what I want to do are usually different things.”

The werewolf snorts, slumping on the mattress as some of the tension dissipates. Sensing an opening, Freya draws closer, gathering the discarded blankets as she moves. She hasn’t missed the way Keelin is trying to cover up her nudity and, even though she wishes the other woman didn’t feel the urge to hide, she understands.

Right now, Keelin is both at her deadliest and her most vulnerable. Freya’s magic has purged her bloodstream of all silver - she doesn’t doubt that for a second - but she feels the werewolf’s lingering fever as she inches closer, hot like sunburn on the exposed parts of her skin. There is only one possible explanation.

The shock of Keelin’s injury must have triggered what pack members call a rut or frenzy. In the presence of a full moon, most werewolves have no choice but to succumb to their primordial instincts. The process differs by degrees for every individual, but the afflicted  usually head down two distinct paths. The most common is the transformation into wolf, often accompanied by destructive, violent behavior. Far rarer is the urge to find a mate to breed. From the way Keelin’s thighs are pressed together, her hips rising in sharp, involuntary thrusts, she is facing the second scenario. In retrospect, Freya should have realized it sooner.

_That should not be possible._ Freya’s eyes flick to the werewolf’s hands, but the narrow band of white gold she gifted her is still in place.

Of course, it is _._ That Keelin isn’t able to remove the ring is, after all, part of the enchantment she imbued it with. Freya’s eyes narrow in thought. Has the spell stopped working? She can’t tell without touching the ring directly but - considering the situation - it would be unwise to work any sort of magic with Keelin so wired up. It hadn’t been nearly as risky before, when the werewolf had been at the edge of consciousness, but at this point, all it’d take to have her throat ripped out is a wrong movement. A wrong word.

Freya’s life has allowed her to see many wondrous, terrible things. Among them, she witnessed the death of a cornered werewolf and it was not pretty.

She and Keelin have come a long way in terms of trust and Freya is loathe to lose any of it.

Moving as close to the bed as she dares, she offers the blanket to Keelin without speaking.   

“I’m s-serious. I could…”

Trembling fingers brush her knuckles as Keelin snatches it from her. The contact is fleeting, almost nonexistent, but Freya has to close her mouth around a surprised gasp.

She can’t smell the werewolf - her powers affect her senses a different way - but when their hands touch, Keelin’s aura becomes visible to her.

Around her, the walls of the apartment turn translucent. Through their ghastly, not-quite-there silhouette, Freya catches sight of woods - fir and pine, pressed so tightly together that she’d have to squeeze between the massive trunks to pass through.

She is reminded of the forests she used to roam in youth: cold places, seldom touched by men, in which the only law was that of wolves.  When she sees herself and Keelin, limbs entwined in a lovers’ embrace, Freya knows she’s glimpsing the other woman’s innermost desires. The vision lasts a heartbeat, but the images are seared into her brain, heating up her cheeks and making her heart beat fast enough to leave her short of breath.

Freya doesn’t need to wait till morning to understand her almost painful need to seek revenge for what was done to Keelin. The answer is spelled – quite clearly – in the drumming of her heart.

Gathering herself, Freya sits on the edge of the bed, one hand closing soothingly around the nape of Keelin’s neck.

“Let me help.”

Under the steady circling of her fingers muscles tense, the cords of Keelin’s neck standing out in stark relief before she relaxes, tilting her face up to peer in Freya’s eyes. She has never looked more beautiful and Freya almost tells her there and then. What stops her is the pleading look Keelin is giving her, one that – despite the way she’s trying to still her face – can mask neither her fear nor her desire.

“How?” Keelin’s voice is a cracked, hoarse whisper. “How can you help me?”

“Like this.”

Grasping her chin so that she can’t pull away, Freya bends down and kisses her.

*********

Keelin doesn’t need to see past a confused outline, to know that Freya is standing at the bedroom’s doorstep. She can scent her anyhow, and she can’t help but inhale deeply, nostrils flaring as she leans toward the witch. First comes the cold burn of Freya’s magic, a smell that Keelin would recognize among a thousand others, even though she’d struggle to put it into words. It scratches at her nose and makes her feel as if her lungs were being pricked by needles. Yet, she cannot get enough.

Next, she detects a trace of something softer and unexpected, a scent she’s never picked up around Freya before. This smell burns too but, unlike Freya’s magic, it is like iron left too long under the sun. Similar to the hurt she’s feeling, but not the same.

_Worry._ The though illuminates her mind like fireworks. _She’s worried about me._

As her eyes adjust to the light coming through the open door, she can keep them open longer, finding her suspicions confirmed when she sees the expression on Freya’s face. A frown is digging a deep line on the witch’s brow, and she’s not bothering to mask it, probably thinking that the bedroom’s semi-darkness is enough to hide it.

Keelin watches her approach, noting how hesitantly she moves. She wonders whether Freya is more scared of being attacked or startling her. Having seen her put herself in harm’s way without a second thought before, Keelin concludes it’s the latter. _But it should be the former._

Her tormented slumber has been plagued by dreams that left her clammy and aroused by turns, but the nightmare she remembers most clearly is the one which shocked her awake, Freya’s name on her lips. Keelin recalls falling back asleep after, but she can still taste the copper it left on her tongue.

“You shouldn’t be here.” Try as she might, Keelin can’t prevent her words from coming out half-mangled. Shivers rush along her limbs and her teeth click together, making her jaws throb. She regrets throwing the blankets to the ground, but the cold is not the only reason.

Keenly aware of her nakedness, she curls into as tight a ball as the gash in her side will allow, hiding a wince in the pillow. A moment later, her embarrassment is forgotten, and she snickers at Freya’s quip, her shoulders loosening a little. Somehow, the witch always knows what to say to make her laugh, or forget her worries, even if for just a second. Freya may present a cold exterior to the world, but Keelin knows better than to fall for that. They both hide behind walls, and maybe it’s foolish to think she can someday breach Freya’s, but she wishes to regardless.

Hoping costs her nothing.

“I’m serious.” She tries again. “You should-”

But, instead of listening, Freya’s touching her and the words of warning Keelin had readied on her tongue drip away from her like water.

She should be the self-assured, sure-footed predator, but in the thrall of Freya’s steady gaze, she feels closer kinship with a deer gone stiff as the wolf closes in for the final strike.

“Let me help.”

The mattress slightly dips under Freya’s weight. Keelin wants to crawl away, but the hand stroking the back of her neck is warm and soft. Soothing. All she can ask is how.

Unable to move, Keelin watches Freya bend toward her lips, obviously meaning to kiss her. She wants to push her back, to yell at her, to urge her to run.

She doesn’t.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The smut you've all been waiting for.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi! Back with chapter 4 after a bit of a delay in the schedule. Last part up next Monday! Happy reading.
> 
> \- Dren

The first touch of Freya’s lips against her own ignites Keelin’s bones like wildfire.

She finds she can’t remember how to breathe, her eyes fluttering shut as sensation overruns every other instinct. Seconds ago she had been ready to beg the witch to keep her locked away until the waning of the moon. Now, Freya’s fingertips lightly tracing her jawline as the kiss deepens, all Keelin can do is claw at the sheets, the room spinning like an out-of-control carousel around them. 

Lightheadedness gives her the impression that the bed is tilting, as if she were floating in the middle of the sea instead, Freya a fleeting stranger that happened to pass her by - stranded and alone - in the dead of night. And just like a castaway Keelin caves in, her hands closing around the other woman’s forearms, holding on for dear life as her lungs burn from lack of air. 

The kiss drowns her, or she allows herself to drown in it; whichever it is, Keelin finds she does not care. 

Eventually they have to break apart. Her chest heaves and she gulps down air as if it were water. The burning in her lungs slowly eases and, if while it raged at its most painful, her heat had masked the fire eating at her bones, it now surges back with  vengeance. It flows along her limbs, and wriggles into the empty spaces between every single bone until all of her is lined in fire.

Keelin is consumed by it, the only thing that prevents her from falling apart the cool touch of Freya’s hands. The witch is still cupping her face, her fingers trembling against her cheek, and with every breath Keelin draws, her lungs fill with Freya’s scent. 

The clear, cold smell of freshly fallen snow soothes her aching ribcage and blankets her mind; inside her head her imagination runs wilder than her wolf, memories of a forest she’s never set paw into filling her head. 

She sees it as well as if she were truly standing among the trees, even though her eyes are still closed. The trees - the pine and fir, intersected with lightly colored birch, extend as far Keelin’s inner eye can roam, towering to impossible heights that make the sky look smaller in comparison. They are ancient things, alive with the same magic running through Freya’s veins, and privy to secrets so dark they’d turn the blood of lesser men to ice. Keelin recognizes it as a place of the spirit - where she is tolerated to tread solely because of Freya’s presence and intervention. 

The old woods surround her for a stretch of time no longer than a heartbeat and the intake of a breath, the return to her burning, aching body is violent and jarring. 

She has time to wonder whether Freya sees anything when touching her, before the world around her lurches, causing her to crumble in the other woman’s waiting arms.

When sight and sound return, Keelin blinks, the room slowly coming back into focus. Her body feels heavier somehow, her mind prey to the kind of confusion one experiences when coming unexpectedly awake.

Inside her chest her heart thumps a frantic rhythm, leaving her short of breath all over again. The feeling of Freya’s mouth pressed against her own hasn’t waned, and it makes her lips tingle, everything else yearn for more.

Time seems to slow around her, until each second is trickling by at the pace of an entire age. Slightly woozy, her mind still half-caught up in her visions, Keelin blinks again but, with her body overloaded by so many contrasting sensations, grounding herself to the present becomes increasingly hard.

Her nose remembers the scent of resin and deer, her hands sting as If she’d really prowled through the snow covering her thoughts. The vision is so powerful that for a moment the room’s ceiling melts into the harsh and clear-cut blue of a midwinter day, but what fills Keelin with wonder is Freya herself. 

The lines between what she can only call a dream and reality blur, the witch seemingly transformed before her eyes. The image is fleeting, barely half-caught before its gone, but Keelin has a glimpse of what Freya must have looked like when Jarls still ruled the northernmost lands. 

In Keelin’s vision Freya’s hair is longer, neatly arranged into a multitude of braids. Runes she cannot decipher have been painted on the witch’s cheeks, the angular script making her eyes water when she stares too long. Freya looks wild, as untamed as Keelin is in wolf form, as secretive as the ancient forests she inhabited. 

One breath later everything is back to normal, or as normal as it can be with her body trying to burn a hole into the bed. 

“That was...It was…” 

There are no words to describe what she had seen without sounding like a raving madwoman, and Keelin falters, completely at a loss. She can’t resist the urge to bring a hand to her forehead, a sigh of relief leaving her when her fingertips meet fevered flesh.

It’s easier, safer to blame the images on her rising temperature than to contemplate alternatives because - if nothing else - she is afraid of what else they could mean. 

But the rut - while painful - is a familiar thing. Like the returning symptom of a chronic illness she can somewhat control, and at the very least endure. 

“It was… certainly unexpected.” 

Freya’s voice is as dry as always, but can’t completely hide a shaky note. Something that makes Keelin even more unsettled: while it is reassuring to know that Freya may have seen something as well - whether or not it is the same thing Keelin cannot know - it’s something else entirely to discover that the witch may be as confused by the vision’s meaning as she feels. 

“What does it mean?” 

“I’m not sure.” Freya shrugs. She pulls back gently, but only to take Keelin’s shaking hands into her own. “Perhaps the spell I used to rid you of the silver bonded us deeper than I expected. Although…” 

She trails off with a frown, her face acquiring a faraway look, her eyes clouded as she gets lost in thought.  

“Although?” 

“Well,” Freya shifts on the bed, “I’ve heard of this happening between people that are… involved. Emotionally.”  

“But we aren’t- I mean-” 

Face on fire, Keelin clamps a hand over her mouth. Everything following their kiss makes very little sense to her, her mind still trying to parse all the images seared behind her eyelids, but the kiss is as clear as if it were still happening. 

And just as undeniable. 

Freya says nothing, her expression patient as she waits for her to finish processing. Her eyes are kind, her lips quivering slightly as if she were trying to hold back a broad smile. 

The witch looks softer than Keelin ever remembers seeing her: not frail or vulnerable, but less guarded than when she entered the room. Perhaps because of the vision they share, Keelin can almost glimpse the residue of power suffusing the other woman. To her, Freya is surrounded in a nimbus of pale-gold, which is streaked with silver where their hands are touching. 

“I mean-” She stops again, her body choosing that moment to betray her. 

Freya is close enough that Keelin can feel the warmth of her body despite the blanket she’s half-wrapped into. Her lower belly is tight with unreleased tension, the stiffness between her legs aching whenever she tries to find a more comfortable position. Pressing her thighs together only makes it worse. 

Keelin doesn’t know what to say. Freya is right of course: there  _ is _ something between them, or at least she hopes that’s what the kiss means. Keelin has pined after the witch for some time, but was too stubborn to fully admit it until circumstances forced her to. Yet allowing her mind to contemplate what her heart already knows is easier than voicing what she wants. 

“You don’t have to say anything.” Freya pushes sweat-soaked hair from her brow. “Only tell me if you want me to stay?” 

“Yes.” 

Keelin doesn’t bother hiding the tremor in her voice. She’s scared. Afraid of having misinterpreted Freya’s gesture, terrified of succumbing to the wolf and hurting her. Closing her eyes, she draws a deep breath, turning her attention inward: her wolf seems surprisingly calm, as if it recognizes Freya as a part of the pack. If anything, it yearns for the witch’s touch. 

Inside her mouth, Keelin’s incisors start to ache, and she imagine how it’d feel to bite at Freya’s pulse. Not to rend her flesh however, like she has done in her nightmare, but for a mating bite.  

Her throat goes dry, her cock giving a painful throb at the thought. To be buried deep inside Freya, the witch writhing under her as they reach climax together. And, as bliss pervades them, mate her, and beg her to be bonded in turn… Keelin frets her heart may burst from mere desire. 

Again, just like other times, it’s Freya who brings her back to the present. 

The mattress dips further as she lays down next to Keelin, body pressed against her unwounded side. Keelin’s startled yelp turns into a hiss of pain when she tries and fails to scramble back, completely taken by surprise. 

The blanket and the fabric of the clothes Freya’s still wears are too thin to act as barrier: the heat of the witch’s body is like that of a furnace, in sharp contrast with the iciness of the powers she can wield. Keelin can feel her skin tingle all along her side, tingles that quickly spread across her belly and to her groin.  _ How is she this warm? It can’t just be my fever.  _

Her erection has become impossible to ignore: glancing at the obvious lump tenting the blanket, Keelin stifles a groan. She has to dig her nails into her palms to keep herself from trying to smooth the comforter - knowing full well it’ll only make her predicament more noticeable. 

It doesn’t help that the vision seemingly heightened her senses further: she is sure she could smell Freya in the midst of a Mardi Gras crowd. Unlike other werewolves, Freya can’t actively broadcast her scent but - perhaps because they are so close - it feels like she is doing just that. 

Scents are the tells of a packmate’s emotion: every werewolf learns that lesson as a pup. Freya’s smell is a veritable tangle: worry, confusion, the ozone-like burn of her magic and, underneath it all, the mouth-watering musk of arousal. It pricks Keelin’s tongue as if she were tasting some hot spice, and sends a rush of heat racing through her cock. Pressure builds at its base, the pounding increasing until it reaches untenable levels. Even the blanket scraping across the tip whenever her hips shift - as discreetly as she can - becomes too much.

Of course it is too much to hope that Freya has not noticed. 

The witch’s lips skim along her jaw, making her jump, but this time Keelin doesn’t try to move away. Her head is too stuffed with Freya’s scent for her to want to, and instead, she shifts closer, with the end result that her shaft presses more firmly against the other woman’s hip. 

Freya’s response sends needy, little shivers through her cock. The witch lets out an appreciative hum, hot breath dampening Keelin’s already flushed neck. Freya nuzzles into the dip of her throat, her teeth grazing over her pulse point hard enough to make Keelin’s heart leap. They feel surprisingly sharp against her flesh.

Her wolf should be raging at the infraction: she is a dominant, it is hers to bite and mark. To claim. But the beast within her seems content to let Freya take initiative, all but rolling belly-up for more attention. 

“I’m still afraid of hurting you.” The words grate against her throat, and Keelin swallows, feeling her throat bob almost painfully. 

“I have a solution for that.” Freya raises her head, meeting her gaze. Her eyes, normally a light. almost icy green, have darkened and filled with lust. Keelin can glimpse her own boundless hunger reflected in the witch’s gaze, and it jolts her spine. 

“Do you trust me?” Freya’s eyes hold her captive, like an insect caught in amber. The moment stretches between them, the silence come alive as if it were capable of breathing. 

Keelin swallows hard.

“Yes.” 

The answer doesn’t come to her lips easily: their start is as far removed from trust as humanly possible. Nothing could erase the memory of her captivity - the long months spent tied up in silver-reinforced chains and magic, while Freya experimented on her blood. But a common enemy first, and growing respect after had helped them bridge the impossible gulf and, if Keelin can’t pinpoint the moment her heart began to beat a different tune in regards to Freya, she can’t deny the truth of what she feels.

“I trust you.” 

Freya smiles and nods, before grasping Keelin’s wrists to guide her arms above her head. 

The words that next fall from her lips are a spell, in a language far older than Latin. Keelin heard her speak such spells before, and they were always her most potent. The words are harsh and cutting, in the beautiful sort of way a sword can be when wielded with purpose. A small whine surges from her chest, every hair of her body trying to stand on edge.

Eyes rolling upwards, Keelin watches as binds come into existence around her wrists. They chill her skin for a moment, before warming up as they coalesce. Outwardly, they have the same function of the cuffs they’d be able to purchase in any decent sex shop, but the material is unlike any Keelin has ever seen. Not metal, but just as strong, it holds the same blue-green hue of an iceberg hit by direct sunlight. 

“There.” Her spell concluded, Freya breathes the word against her lips, before kissing her tenderly. “These should work.”

Keelin finds nothing to say in reply, her skin pebbled in goosebumps as Freya’s hands stroke down her arms. When the witch removes the blanket and straddles her, all she is able to do is surge up as much as her restraints allow, mouth falling open against Freya’s. 

Her invitation doesn’t go unanswered, and they kiss with abandon, her hips angling up as she searches for relief against Freya’s thigh. The way she’s rutting against the other woman - leaving a glistening trail of pre-cum on her pants - should shame Keelin, but she’s too consumed by need to care. 

Freya doesn’t seem to mind. She pulls back from the kiss, but not before she’s tugged at Keelin’s lower lip, hard enough to make it sting. 

Hips swaying in rhythm with hers Freya sits back a little, pulling her shirt off with one fluid motion. She flings the garment across the room, but Keelin doesn’t follow its trajectory. She has eyes only for Freya.

Underneath the shirt, the witch is braless. Her breasts sway gently as she shifts to unzip her pants, her dusky nipples hardening the moment they are exposed to the cool air of the room. If it weren’t for the bindings holding her to the bed, Keelin would sit up and take one in her mouth. As it is, she can only daydream about the delicious sounds she could rip from Freya’s throat if given the chance. 

Instead, she is the one to whine, her eyes widening as Freya slowly strips for her. By the time the witch is done, Keelin is ready to beg for her touch. She’d do anything for it, but thankfully she doesn’t have to. 

Freya smiles down at her as if she knows exactly what is going on inside her mind.  _ She probably does. _ Keelin has time for that thought before her mind empties. Freya palms her breasts, tweaking and pulling at her nipples until Keelin is arching off the bed, her shoulders aching from the unnatural angle. Freya’s mouth follows the path her hands take, and Keelin writhes underneath it, utterly helpless. 

Moving ever lower Freya stops just shy of her swollen, twitching cock, hot breath skirting along Keelin’s hip bone.

“Goddess, please!” 

The route that Freya takes in answer to her plea is torture. 

First, she starts by peppering her lower belly with kisses. Her mouth follows the contours of Keelin’s hip, tongue flicking out to lap salty traces of sweat off her skin. Then, when she’s about to focus her attention on Keelin’s length, Freya pauses again, long enough to ensnare her gaze a second time. 

She kisses and licks up from the base of the shaft, making sure she’s never breaking eye contact with Keelin. Emotions are like a stormfront crossing Freya’s face: desire, need and - Keelin’s heart leaping into her throat when she reads it in the witch’s eyes - love. 

Keelin does her best to keep on watching, but white spots dance across her vision, partially obscuring it. She’s already so close to release, she risks spilling all over Freya’s upturned face. She wishes she had something to hold on to, but the chains of magic connecting the cuffs to the bed frame are at an angle too uncomfortable to hold onto for long. Still she tries, stifling a groan when Freya’s tongue skates across her cock’s engorged tip, precum spilling from it in response. 

Already her seed is rushing up her length, pressure building right under the quivering tip. Her wolf’s primal instinct roars at her to let go, to let her cum stain Freya’s skin so that every last whelp in New Orleans will know who the witch belongs to.

Although considering their current position, it is  _ clearly _ the other way around.

Freya stops again, a grin worthy of a pack leader gracing her lips.  _ She wants me to.  _ Keelin realizes with a moan.  _ Oh Gods, she does. Oh Gods, oh-  _

The witch’s hand, which up to that point had rested on her hip to hold her steady, closes around her shaft, pumping upwards. The motion is sudden, fast and Keelin shudders under Freya’s touch, unable to resist the witch’s will. 

Head thrown back she comes, the world around her dissolving into a blaze of white.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Keelin and Freya mate for good

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And we're at the end of the fic! I had fun with the pairing, even though I really know nothing about the show. I hope you enjoyed reading this as much as I liked writing it.  
> \- Dren

Watching Keelin buck and pull at her restraints, sends a thrill of excitement to rush down Freya’s spine. The werewolf isn’t tamed – not by a longshot – but willingly submitted. To peer into her eyes is to stare at a bottomless abyss and, when she does, Freya experiences a moment of adrenaline-inducing vertigo. Keelin’s rut has progressed to the point in which her eyes have changed, paling from hazel to the amber-gold of her wolf half. Her pupils are dilated and the black has spilled outward to swallow her irises almost completely. The hunger filling her eyes inexorably conquers the rest of her face.

Possibly not completely aware of what she is doing, Keelin tenses every few moments, her nostrils flaring and her mouth agape as she inhales.  _ She’s scenting me.  _ Freya shivers in anticipation.  _ Can she smell how wet I am?  _

She gets her answer when Keelin lets out a plaintive whine, her hips stuttering upward as she seeks relief against Freya’s thigh.

Looking down, she cannot help but hum in appreciation. Keelin is fully erect – painfully so if the little noises that escape the werewolf’s throat whenever the tip of her cock finds contact with Freya’s leg are anything to go by. It’s beautiful, long and thick, and she can feel Keelin’s heartbeat reverberate along its length as it throbs against her. The gleaming trails of pre-cum Keelin leaves on the dark fabric of her jeans in her mindless rutting make Freya’s mouth water for a taste. She finds it difficult to swallow, and drool fills her mouth again after she does.   

_ I wonder how she’d taste on my tongue.  _

_ How she’d feel inside me. _

Almost overcome by dizziness, Freya has to tear her gaze away. But even though she isn’t looking down at what she caused, she can still feel the heat of Keelin’s firmness through her jeans. A gallery of images – one dirtier than the last - flits through her mind, and her cheeks turn a violent shade of red.

Suddenly, she feels jealous of the werewolf’s sharper senses: while her magic can sometimes have that side effect, it’s not one to be sought on purpose. Magic, and in particular the raw power that one such as she can evoke are more addicting than a drug, and Freya has seen witches stronger than she is draw too much of it inside themselves. The results are – quite literally – incendiary, and never pretty. She longs to get drunk on Keelin’s scent the same way the werewolf is on hers – and she has to grab her soon-to-be lover by the hips to try and ground herself. Her nails dig into Keelin’s fevered flesh, and a hiss travels through the werewolf’s body in response. She tries to surge off the bed with all her might and the headboard groans and creaks under the strain.

It is tempting to let her eyes fall to Keelin’s groin again, and watch her drip onto the mattress. Freya resists, and instead begins disrobing, her fingers tearing at her clothing hard enough she pops a button or two loose by accident. Desirous urges spike under her skin and make it itch as badly as if a small army of ants had taken residence inside her. She can’t stand to be clothed any longer. 

_ If I didn’t know it isn’t possible, I’d think she’s sending me into heat.  _ But no - while it can be said she has transcended her humanity, that would defy the very laws on which reality is founded.  _ Except… _

Except she has to exercise every ounce of her will to keep herself from undoing her spell and presenting on all fours for Keelin’s pleasure.  

_ Later _ . Her hands fall to her waist, and she engages a fight with the zipper of her pants.  _ I’ll think about it later. _

Right now Freya is burning up too much to dissect her own reactions. Her body is animated by a mind all of its own, and would not obey her anyhow. Maybe everything can be connected to the spell she used to save the werewolf’s life: after all, magic as powerful and ancient as the one she used sometimes has unforeseen consequences. 

Yet the why and the how seem inconsequential under Keelin’s lust-filled gaze.

The fabric of her jeans is soaked through with sweat, and Freya has to shift awkwardly around the bed to peel them off. She pulls her panties down at the same time, not wanting to waste any more time than is necessary bothering with clothes. The itchiness that was driving her crazy moments before has turned to an all-consuming kind of warmth. It completely envelops her, and Freya isn’t surprised to find that, despite the apartment’s air conditioning, she’s still sweating profusely.

In the half-light, her skin glistens softly and more sweat runs down her collarbone and shoulder blades in rivulets. Keelin’s heated gaze causes her already flushed cheeks to redden further: the werewolf is openly staring and licking her lips, a low, appreciative rumble rattling inside her chest. 

Freya shudders and, surprising herself, somewhat preens at Keelin’s unabashed enjoyment. Living for as long as she has, one is bound to take lovers into their bed. Freya has done so as well, even though it didn’t take long for her to understand that more durable relationships with simple mortals are fraught with pain and loss for those who are blessed and cursed to be a witch. 

_ But with Keelin perhaps… _

With Keelin perhaps she has a chance. 

“Please… Freya…” Keelin’s broken plea draws Freya back to the present. She realizes her thoughts and insecurities have frozen her in place and, with an apologetic shrug, she lowers herself to the bed, careful not to jostle her lover too much. There is comfort to be found in the waves of heat coming off of Keelin’s body, in the hungry way the werewolf returns her kiss when Freya covers her lover’s mouth with hers.  

But neither of them can be satisfied with that for long, and soon enough Freya’s hands begin to wander. For those who know where to look Keelin’s body tells a story, one that unfolds for her as she traces every dip and every curve. Werewolves heal faster than humans but - as the gash along Keelin’s side easily demonstrates - they can be wounded. Freya had been too focused on her lover’s most recent hurt to notice the rest, but now her fingertips find evidence of other, older battles. 

Claw marks, faded to an almost translucent white by the passage of time, break the bronzed perfection of Keelin’s shoulder. The thin lines continue and wrap around her upper arm and Freya shudders, imagining two frenzied wolves biting and raking at each other.    

There is more: raised, whitish tissue in the shape of a bite on the part of Keelin’s belly not covered by linen, more scars - these look like the mauling done by a bear - around one of her thighs. 

Freya would like nothing better than to map each and every one with her fingers and her mouth, but she doesn’t think her lover would agree with that idea. 

Already Keelin is begging for her to focus attention where she needs it most. The further down her mouth strays, the more ragged the werewolf’s breath becomes.  

While it would be tempting to edge Keelin for hours, in the end Freya decides against it. Her lover is tugging at her magical restraints, her back arching off the bed every few minutes. The bandages covering a section of her midriff seem to glow in the semi-darkness, and are a stark reminder of the nasty injury beneath. Besides, Freya has no patience left for foreplay either. 

Her gaze keeps traveling to Keelin’s erection and - after she has wet her lips - Freya settles down between her lover’s legs, mouth working from the bottom upwards. 

Against her lips, Keelin’s cock is as firm as she had imagined. The skin is hot, flushed a reddish shade by rushing blood. Already, clear fluid is leaking from the puffy tip and - as she laps along the throbbing length, Freya gets a first taste of what Keelin’s release will be like. 

The werewolf’s pre-come fills her mouth like ocean overflow. She laves Keelin’s shaft with languid sweeps of her tongue, alternating them with gentle, butterfly-like kisses. 

Breath ghosting across the bobbing tip of her lover’s cock Freya pauses: the werewolf’s body is lathered in sweat, and the muscles of her thighs contract in synch with her every touch. Keelin is close already, and at the prospect of having the doctor fountain down her throat she begins to salivate.  

“You taste so good.” She runs her tongue in circles over the engorged cockhead, Keelin’s answering moans the most beautiful melody she’s ever heard. “So good.”

Deciding that they both have waited long enough, Freya takes the head fully into her mouth and rolls her tongue around it firmly, one hand closing around the base to stroke up in a pumping motion. 

Keelin spills onto her tongue almost immediately, the sheer quantity of her come taking Freya by surprise. She manages to swallow some, before having to pull back and catch a breath, and the rest of it patters like warm rain over her collarbone and breasts. 

She stares enthralled as the werewolf’s eyes glaze over, her face slack as pleasure courses through her like a wave of molten fire. Not surprisingly, Keelin’s erection hasn’t softened at all, and the base of her cock has instead begun to swell. The skin there is even hotter than the rest and - when Freya experimentally kneads the growing knot - the werewolf thrashes weakly, even as the aftershocks of her peak are still passing over her body. 

Her own need setting her flesh aflame, Freya climbs on hands and knees, a whimper leaving her lips when Keelin’s length brushes against her inner thigh. She gathers some of the come dripping down her chest and pops her fingers into her mouth. Then, just as Keelin’s eyes find hers, she straddles her lover’s hips and grinds down. 

**************

When her sight returns, the view leaves Keelin breathless. Freya is straddling her, sucking what is left of her release from her fingers and slowly lowering herself upon her cock. 

_ She wants to ride me. She’s gonna ride me. Oh. Gods… _

A growl erupts from her, and she jerks her hips in search of contact, Freya’s sweet heat calling to the primal side of hers that Keelin usually keeps under tight control. The witch is practically dripping and, when the broad cockhead parts her folds she gasps, eagerly offering herself. 

Keelin knows she should caution Freya to start slow. Perhaps because this is her first rut in quite some time, her cock feels…  _ bigger _ . It shouldn’t be possible, it’s probably her dominant side talking, but it surely feels that way. And, as she rolls her eyes to look at what Freya is doing, she notices the purplish knot at the base of her erection. 

She opens her mouth - to say what, exactly, she is not completely sure - but before words have a chance to take form, the tip of her cock nudges Freya’s entrance. After that her mind goes blank and all Keelin can do is  _ feel _ .

First, comes wet, engulfing warmth. Then, as Freya lowers herself down and takes her in more fully, comes tightness. The witch is soft as silk around her length, the walls of her cunt squeezing hard with every little thrust of Keelin’s hips. She’d be able to spear deeper if it weren’t for the chains that hold her to the bed, but she soon finds out there is no need. Freya gladly does most of the work, lifting herself a couple of inches before she slams back down, this time taking her inside all the way to the knot. It presses against Freya’s tight opening, and she grinds against it with a hiss, the sound echoed by Keelin’s own full-throated moan. 

“You don’t have…” Words catch in the back of her throat and her voice cracks.

Freya clenches around her so hard Keelin feels every little shiver of her walls. It’s almost as if her lover’s sex was molded to perfectly sheathe her, and her train of thought is yet again derailed. 

“I want to.” Freya reassures, her voice strained not by pain as Keelin had feared, but by a desire that knew no bounds. “I can take you.”  

Following her words, the witch grinds down again, her opening ever so slowly widening to accommodate the knot’s considerable girth. Every few moments she has to halt and let her body adjust, but Keelin is grateful for the little respite that gives her. Pressure has built inside her shaft to an unbearable level and she knows that, the instant Freya takes her knot completely, she will come again. 

Part of her is ashamed of the fact she won’t last long at all - her enthusiasm like that of a pup at their first shift - but the wolf within her is full of pride. Even though Freya has assured her of the contrary, Keelin is aware that this must hurt the witch just as much as it is bringing her pleasure. 

Above her, her lover moans, then a triumphant howl falls from her mouth just as the knot slots inside her with an almost audible click.

She comes and crashes down on Keelin, the witch’s face buried in the crook if her neck as her cunt milks her for all that she is worth. Freya’s screams are somewhat muffled against her skin, but the way she heaves and squirms is irresistible. Keelin is swept along with her, a second release flowing from her in thick, violent spurts to flood her lover’s pussy. 

Just like the first time, there is no buildup. One moment she is rushing towards her peak, the next she’s falling over the edge as if she’d flung herself into a chasm hoping that, somehow, she’ll learn to fly before she meets the ground. 

Frantic, every last bone in her body shaking as if trying to come loose, Keelin searches for a place to anchor herself. She finds it in the straining, elegant curve of Freya’s throat and, before she realizes what she’s doing, her teeth close around the witch’s maddened pulse. 

She tastes Freya’s heartbeat on her tongue, and she bites down.  

**************

Hours later Freya wakes, lassitude pervading her limbs. She feels sore – pleasantly achy in all the right places – and decides she’s earned the right to bask in the feeling a little longer. Her magic is taking more of a toll on her than she initially expected, and she finds herself drifting back to sleep. It’s a gentle sort of descent and she spirals along gladly, like a leaf transported by the gurgling current of a stream. She lies there a while, caught in the blurry, partially aware state that exists between dreams and wakefulness. The mattress is soft and plush underneath her, and she is far too comfortable to move.  

After some more time has passed, her body forces her to. She stretches slowly, wincing when her joints pop, and her jaws are cracked as open as they possibly can go by a yawn. 

As she becomes more aware of her body, Freya realizes she is cold. Some of it is due to tiredness – like the small tremors covering her arms in goosebumps – the rest to the traces of sticky sweat still dampening her skin.

Eyes screwed stubbornly shut against the gowning light, Freya gropes about for a blanket, or the sheets, a dissatisfied groan leaving her lips when she remembers of having kicked everything to the floor hours ago.

However, her fingers are met with something soft and she clutches at it reflexively, eliciting a small whine in response. The sound that reaches her ears is definitely  _ not  _ human.

Eyes flying open, Freya rolls onto her side. Next to her, a wolf is twitching in its sleep.. 

The animal is big enough to take up an entire side of the bed. It’s snoring softly and every so often it kicks its hind legs as if dreaming of a run.  _ She, not it. _ Freya thinks through her stupor.  _ Keelin must have shifted after we… _

Cheeks suffused in a delicate shade of pink, she brings her free hand to her throat. With the other she is still gripping a fistful of the wolf’s fur, and is reluctant to let go.

As she feels the spot where Keelin bit her, Freya’s heart slows, and a sense of peace envelops her.  _ So it’s true.  _ Underneath her fingertips the skin is tender and bruised, a thin crust already covering the places where her lover’s teeth drew blood.  _ She marked me as hers. As her mate. _

And, judging by the tendrils of magic energy wrapped around them both, so has she in her own way.

Body wracked by another set of shivers, Freya wiggles closer to the wolf and buries her face into the thick ruff of her neck. Feeling Keelin’s ribcage rise and fall in even breaths against her chest is reassuring, and Freya yawns again, snuggling into her warmth.

_ Wait.  _ Sharp fear stabs through her, and Freya runs her hands along Keelin’s side, scared that turning into wolf form may have aggravated the wound that she sustained. But underneath the brown, honey-flecked fur, what she can see of Keelin’s skin is unbroken. Even more surprisingly – unscarred.

What is left of the bandages Freya so carefully wrapped around Keelin’s injury is a tattered, blood-streaked  mess which can be glimpsed half-buried under her form.

Disturbed by her movements, the wolf stirs and slowly blinks awake. Amber eyes meet hers, Keelin’s cold nose pressing against her cheek.

“I was just checking the wound. I didn’t mean to wake you.” Freya apologizes as she tries to squirm away- The wolf’s wet nose against her skin is making her colder. Keelin huffs and simply shifts on top of her, pinning her in place with her weight.

_ Well, at least now I’ll be warm.  _ Freya gives up on her escape attempt and laughs, scratching the wolf between her ears. 

“You’re cute like this, you know that?” 

Keelin’s eyes gather the light. They shine like golden coins, serene and full of the wisdom her ancestors have passed down onto her. A flash of disapproval brightens them - the werewolf disagreeing with the choice of adjective - and Freya laughs again and playfully ruckles up the wolf’s ears. 

To escape the attention, Keelin tosses her massive head from side to side, a low growl making the air between them quiver. There’s no threat in it, and the wolf noses at Freya’s throat until she finds the spot she marked, her wet, raspy tongue lapping at the bruise in an effort to soothe it.  

“It doesn’t hurt that much.” Freya’s words of reassurance are half-eaten by another yawn: between the heat coming off of Keelin’s wolf body and her lingering exhaustion, she feels ready to sleep another century or two.

Keelin’s growling has softened to a rumble and, when she looks at her again, Freya discovers that the werewolf has settled back down.  _ I’m not the only one that could rest a little longer.  _

Smiling, she hugs Keelin close and allows her eyes to slip shut again. Having the wolf lay on top of her works better than any blanket would, but sleep is not as easy to find as Freya initially imagined. 

Her mind drifts, the same way it does when she willingly travels away from her body and is drawn to the knife she left sitting on the doctor’s desk. 

The weapon retains only a little of the intent her creator imbued it with, but its darkness is sharp enough to make her grimace. 

_ There will be time later.  _ Freya isn’t sure where the thought is coming from: all she knows is that it isn’t hers. With it comes the same sense of peace she felt upon discovering Keelin’s mark is real, and she tightens her hold around the wolf, turning her thoughts away from revenge for the time being.

The voice is right: there will be time later. All the time in the world.

The last thing she feels before sleep finally conquers her, is Keelin’s nose booping against her own.

**Author's Note:**

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